Saviour
by libbyQuin
Summary: To those who are dying, Mitchell is the final hope. He is the Jesus to their lepers. Because for them, a half-life is better than none at all. And they will beg and plead and haunt him until he submits.


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A/N: Me again, with more Mitchell-centric stuff. This is set somewhere towards the end of series one, and is something that I came up with after watching _Jesus Christ Superstar_. If I'm honest, that was over a month ago and this has been sitting, fully written, on my desk since then, waiting to be typed up and posted. And there's about four more BH fics that are ready to be typed, it's just that for the past two weeks I have been in Dunedin as part of the National Shakespeare Schools Production company, and so my mind has been full of _Cymbeline _rather than BH. Sorry!  
Needless to say, I own nothing - although hopefully I will soon own series 1 and 2 on DVD (it only just came out in NZ). BH belongs to the BBC/Toby Whithouse, and the lyrics belong to Andrew Lloyd Webber/Tim Rice.  
Enjoy, and please review (even if you didn't enjoy)!

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Saviour

_See my eyes, I can hardly see  
__See me stand, I can hardly walk  
__I believe you can make me whole_  
_See my tongue, I can hardly talk_  
_See my skin, I'm a mass of blood_  
_See my legs, I can hardly stand  
__I believe you can make me well  
__See my purse, I'm a poor, poor man_

- 'The Temple', from _Jesus Christ Superstar  
_

Mitchell pushed the bucket and mop through the hospital's corridors mindlessly. He couldn't remember exactly where he was supposed to be going – in fact, he couldn't remember anything from that morning. The only thoughts in his head were of Herrick, and his 'recruitment strategy'. In theory, Mitchell thought, the idea was sound. He could feed without guilt and help people who were only dying anyway. However, Lauren's face kept cutting though his optimism. Of course, it hadn't been her choice, but the way she'd been acting reminded him of what becoming a vampire meant. The people who asked to be turned couldn't have any idea of the consequences of becoming an immortal.

Mitchell shoved open the door to a ward, thinking he'd just push the mop around until lunchtime. He looked around and saw that there were a lot more patients in there than there should have been, and they were all staring at him. He was about to ask what was going on when a young woman pushed through the crowd, holding out a hand to him.

"I'm sick, Mitchell, I'm so sick…no-one else can help me…"

She staggered forwards and fell to the ground at Mitchell's feet. He stepped back away from her in confusion and looked around for one of the doctors. With a lurch of apprehension he saw that the other inhabitants of the room were also pressing forwards, many of them unsteady on their feet as they pushed towards him.

"I can hardly breathe," wheezed one man. "Help me breathe, Mitchell."

Before Mitchell could reply, the other patients started to appeal to him, reaching out wasted arms, gaunt faces pleading.

"They say there's nothing more they can do for me…"

"I'm not going to last three months…"

"I'll be gone by Christmas…"

"Unless you help me…"

"Please help me, Mitchell…"

Mitchell glanced around in confusion and fear. He looked into the bloodshot eyes of the people closest to him, seeing their desperation and entreaty.

"I can't help you, I'm not a doctor, I don't know what to do –" he stuttered wildly. Their proximity was disturbing and the smell of their thin, diseased blood hung heavy in the air, fogging his mind. "You all need a doctor, I can't help you, I'm not a doctor –"

"Doctors can't help me!" shrieked a woman with open sores on her face.

"It has to be you, Mitchell…"

"Please, Mitchell, save me…"

"Give me new life…"

And suddenly it clicked. Herrick had been here, had told them of the salvation that waited on the other side of death. Now they wanted him to sink his fangs into their flesh and let them taste his blood. They wanted him to turn them.

"No, no, I can't, you don't understand –"

"I need you, Mitchell…"

"Bite me, save me…"

"Heal me, Mitchell…"

"End my pain –"

"Make me well –"

"Change my life –"

"Give me hope –"

"Free me –"

"Save me!"

They suddenly surged forward and Mitchell turned and ran. He sprinted through the hospital's hallways, which were inexplicably filled with more pleading, imploring people in hospital gowns. They reached out to Mitchell as he ran past, beseeching, begging. A man with a gaping hole in his stomach lurched toward him; a woman with weeping lesions on her skin cried out to him; a child writhing in pain on the floor held out a wasted arm and he almost tripped over –

Mitchell hurtled through a set of double doors into another ward. This one, too, was packed with dying people. When he entered they all looked round at him and started to entreat him to turn them.

"You've got to help me –"

"Look, I can hardly stand –"

"No-one else can save me –"

"You can make me whole –"

"I know you can change me –"

"You're the one –"

"I can't bear this pain –"

"Look at me, I'm wasting away –"

"My body's given up –"

"I don't want to die –"

"Be my saviour –"

"You can help them, Mitchell."

A familiar voice cut through the pleas. Mitchell turned to see Herrick, standing in the midst of the crowd, looking out of place in his neat police uniform.

"Herrick!" exclaimed Mitchell, relieved to find a familiar, if not particularly comforting, presence. "What the hell have you done? How many did you tell?"

"They deserve a second chance at life, Mitchell. All of them," Herrick replied, raising his voice over the discordant wailing of the crowd. "You can give it to them."

"No, I can't – there's so many of them –" Mitchell's protests were lost amongst the renewed pleas of the throng, who were pressing in closer with every passing second.

"You can't leave them, Mitchell," said Herrick calmly. "You can't leave them to die. Go on, it's easy. All you have to do is feed."

Mitchell looked around at the horde of sick and dying people, all shuffling towards him like zombies, and then back at Herrick.

"I can't. I can't turn them. I can't do that to them."

"This is different, Mitchell!" smiled Herrick. "They're asking for it! They're begging you!"

Mitchell shook his head desperately. "They don't know what they're asking for," he said. "They don't understand what it means. They have visions of strength and power and everlasting life but they don't know the flipside –"

"They want you to do it, Mitchell!" cut in Herrick. "They want you to heal them, they know you can. You're the Jesus to their lepers."

"This isn't holy! It's not a miracle!" exclaimed Mitchell vehemently. "It's evil, it's wicked, it's a curse!"

"Let them decide, Mitchell. One bite and one taste. That's all it takes."

Mitchell glanced around frantically as the incessant begging of the crowd grew louder and louder as they got closer and closer. Their banshee wailing was fragmenting his thoughts, destroying his reason. He looked back to Herrick, but he had disappeared amongst the imploring mass.

Suddenly a hand grabbed the front of his shirt and he looked down in terror, into the clouded eyes of a young woman with a trickle of blood in the corner of her mouth. He tried to pull free from her grasp but there were bodies seething to him from all sides and he couldn't move. Mitchell cried out as more hands grabbed at his clothes, pleading, beseeching.

"No, stop – don't grab me – don't crowd me – just let me think, let me breathe – stop –"

But the swarm kept pushing forwards, pressing in on him from everywhere, begging to be turned into unholy monsters. Nothing he said or did stopped them.

"Stop it, please, I can't breathe, oh God, leave me alone, I can't help you – _you're better off dead_!"

Mitchell's eyes flew open and he gasped for breath. He looked around his messy room wildly, his eyes seeing better in the dark than they did during the day.

No crowd, no Herrick, no hospital – just his room, his scattered belongings, his original King Kong poster, his behemoth of a wardrobe. Normal, everything was normal and safe and just as he'd left it.

As he calmed down and his breathing slowed, he ran a hand over his face and through his messy dark hair. He was soaked in sweat and he'd kicked most of his blankets off. He pulled them back over his shivering body and fumbled on the floor for his phone to check the time. 3.48 am. He could go and get a drink from the kitchen, but then he'd almost certainly run into Annie, and he couldn't bear to talk about what could only be described as a nightmare – even to her. Best to stay in bed and try to forget about it.

This was insane. Mitchell knew it wasn't at all like that – it was one person at a time, they explained everything, there was nothing like the begging and pleading of his dream. No-one saw him as some sort of perverse saviour – just as someone with another alternative. And yet…

The dream lingered. Mitchell could almost feel the claw-like hands pulling at his clothes. The sensation made his skin crawl.

As soon as he could face it, he would go and see Herrick. It wasn't going to work any longer.

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**FIN.**


End file.
